Re: Gray Jays?

["Kristin Purdy" <kristinpurdy at comcast dot net>]

Linda,

Gray Jays are such excellent cachers of food that not only are they
year-round residents of those high elevations, but they nest there in the
winter, too.  About the time we're wondering if winter is ever going to
break, Gray Jays are nesting--same for another most excellent corvid cacher,
the Clark's Nutcracker.

To add to Eric's stories of birds caching food, this past August my husband
called me out to the yard to show me a magpie prize carefully hidden in the
landscaping.  As hubby had watched, a magpie came walking around a rock
retaining wall carrying in its beak a whole and perfect California Quail
egg.  About a month earlier, I had finally discovered the spot where the
quail had nested this spring; under a juniper shrub and about 15 feet from
the rock wall.  The magpie very carefully parted a bunch of creeping phlox
hanging over the wall, tucked the egg into the cushiony flowers, and
departed.  A few days later, my husband saw the magpie return, dig around in
the phlox, retrieve the egg, crack it open, and eat it.

I might have been upset that the magpie got one of my quail eggs, knowing
that this was the first year California Quail have nested in the yard.
However, the quail had hatched, grown before our eyes, and departed about 2
months before the magpie cached that egg.  Imagine how good that 2-month old
egg tasted.

I still wonder where that egg was hiding all that time.  When I discovered
the nest site, all that was left was the depression and the broken shell
fragments.  Maybe that magpie had stolen the egg a long time ago and was
simply transferring it to a new site out in the yard.

Kris
----- Original Message -----
From: "Linda S Butler" <lindasbutler@juno.com>
To: <birdtalk@utahbirds.org>
Sent: Thursday, January 12, 2006 6:17 PM
Subject: Gray Jays?


> As I wrote about blue jays in my last thread, I got to thinking of other
> jays--the Gray Jays AKA Camp Robbers. I've seen them up by Mirror Lake in
> the summer. Do they winter there, too? If not, where do they go? I've
> never seen them outside of the Mirror Lake Highway area. Seems like it
> would be awfully cold and snowy up there for those birds.
> just curious,
> Linda
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